Re: The state of IPv6 multihoming development

[Tim Chown <tjc@ecs.soton.ac.uk>]

On Tue, Oct 22, 2002 at 04:08:56PM -0700, Tony Li wrote:
> 
> It's vitally important in the sense that if we deploy
> the wrong solution (or no solution), then we end up back
> on the exponential curve and it will be that much harder
> to change later because we would then have an installed
> base.
> 
> In other words, the sequence should not be: ready, fire, 
> aim.
> 
> ;-)

OK, containment (of the DFZ table size) is certainly a good goal.

But who is actually going to be multihoming with IPv6, and to what extent?
Perhaps there are now 50,000 large enterprises doing so with IPv4.  Is the
number of such enterprises going to rise?   What's the change in terms of
the types of sites multihoming that's pushing the DFZ size up so much?
Small ISPs?  Smaller enterprises?

I'm just curious as to who the multihomers are, and best guesstimates of
future growth.   Do we foresee home users multihoming to multiple ISPs?
I don't pay for resilience now with two telephone lines, or having DSL and
cable lines; paying double isn't economic for Joe User.   The same I assume 
would be true for mobile handsets.   Academia + home users + mobile (3G) users
is (or will be) a large chunk of the Internet;  all three can benefit from 
IPv6 now, or in the near future.

The crux seems to be projected top limits on who will demand multihoming,
and what clas of users those people/sites are?   Of course, predicting 10
years ahead is a tad tricky :)

Any pointers to research/stats on this would be interesting.

Tim